Scotts has agreed to recall these products from all retail locationsacross the United States and to set up a process for consumers to safelyreturn any unregistered products they may have purchased.

An EPA consumer hotline to answer questions about the action has beenestablished at 888-838-1304 (9 a.m. - 4:30 p.m., Central Daylight Time).Questions may also be answered by the National Pesticide Information Centerat 800-858-7378 (6:30 a.m. - 4:30 p.m., Pacific Daylight Time, includingweekends). A fact sheet and regularly updated information are posted onlineat http://www.epa.gov/reg5rcra/ptb/news/.

At this time the risks, if any, posed by these unregistered productsare unknown. EPA and its state partner Ohio Department of Agriculture areconducting a laboratory analysis of these products. Updated informationwill be posted online when it becomes available. Until EPA has moreinformation about the contents of these products, consumers are advised notto use these products and to store them in a safe, cool and dry place suchas a garage or utility shed. Do not dispose of them down the drain, in thegarbage or at a community disposal site.

In an effort to make sure these products are immediately removed fromthe marketplace, EPA will also issue stop sale orders to major retailersthat carry these products.

Under the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide and Rodenticide Act, allpesticides must be submitted to EPA for review, evaluation and registrationto ensure that they do not pose an unreasonable risk to human health or theenvironment. EPA's review and registration process is internationallyrecognized. Pesticide products that have not undergone EPA review may poserisks to human health and the environment.

"A manufacturer such as Scotts cannot ignore the important legalrequirement of registering its pesticides," said Region 5 AdministratorMary A. Gade. "This is a serious violation of EPA's system for protectingpeople and the environment from the potential harmful effects ofpesticides. EPA will fully investigate this violation and take appropriateactions. We are committed to keeping the public informed about any healthconsequences and providing information to assure the safe recall of theseproducts as soon as possible."

For more information on pesticides, go tohttp://www.epa.gov/reg5rcra/ptb/pest.

Here is an example of a terrible wrong against those with cancer, but at last a show of some integrity by the original investigator.

I just wonder how long it will take for MSM to change their focus.

Those of us who understand nutrients and anti-oxidants, minerals, and vitamins were correct all along.

"ANTIOXIDANTS: CANCER LINK WAS ALL A MISTAKE"

It was news when it was claimed in 2005 & again recently, that vitamins can speed up cancer development. But the researcher who first published the study has now admitted that she got it wrong.

It made headlines around the world when it stated that patients who took Beta Carotene or vitamin E were 40% more likely to suffer a cancer recurrence. This year Cochrane Collaborative released a meta-analysis that suggested that antioxidants may shorten life.

But researchers from the Laval Uni Cancer Research Center in Quebec, led by Isabelle Bairati - the scientist who published the 2005 study - have re-analyzed the orginal data & discovered that they got it wrong.

The only people in the study who had their cancer return were smokers who refused to kick the habit while receiving radio or chemotherapy.

MINNEAPOLIS, May 27 -- Most health coverage in the mainstream media fails to address the costs, harms, and benefits of medical products and procedures, according to the publisher of HealthNewsReview.org, a Web site that grades journalists.

The coverage also usually ignores the quality of the evidence and the existence of other options, said Gary Schwitzer, B.A., of the University of Minnesota School of Journalism, who worked for 30 years as consumer healthcare journalist in radio, television, interactive multimedia, and the Internet.

On the other hand, he wrote in the May issue of the online journal PLoS Medicine, 85% of the time the mainstream media put the true newness of a procedure or product into context.

The findings come from an examination of 500 stories during the first 22 months of the Web site, which started publishing evaluations of health news stories in April 2006. Schwitzer, an associate professor of journalism, is publisher of the Web site.

The 22 months of reviews are "the clearest picture yet available of how major newspapers, magazines, and television networks cover treatments, tests, products, and procedures," he said.

He and colleagues monitor the top 50 newspapers (in circulation) in the U.S., the Associated Press, the three leading newsweekly magazines (Time, Newsweek, and U.S. News & World Report) and the morning and evening newscasts of ABC, CBS, and NBC.

News stories were rated as satisfactory, unsatisfactory, or not applicable on a 10-point set of criteria by two independent reviewers, with Schwitzer voting to break ties. The Web site has a panel of 27 reviewers, many in academic medicine.

In a random sample of 30 stories, two independent reviewers agreed on the assessment 74% of the time, he reported.

Stories were rated on whether they:

* Discussed costs. Only 23% got a satisfactory rating. * Quantified benefits. Only 28% were satisfactory. * Quantified harms. Only 33% were satisfactory. * Discussed existing alternate options. Only 38% were satisfactory. * Sought independent sources and explored conflicts of interests in sources. Fifty-six percent were satisfactory on this count. * Avoided "disease mongering" -- making common conditions like baldness into disease states. At 70%, most were satisfactory. * Discussed quality of the evidence, including the strengths and weakness of study types. Only 35% were satisfactory. * Established the true newness of the approach, where 85% did a satisfactory job. * Discussed the availability of the new approach, important when reporting on investigational drugs and procedures. At 70%, most were satisfactory. * Went beyond a news release, by seeking outside sources. Here, 65% were satisfactory.

The upshot is that health coverage often delivers "an imbalanced picture of health care interventions," Schwitzer said, at least partly because newsroom cutbacks have reduced the time and resources available for health coverage.

In a sidebar to the study, Schwitzer highlighted several stories he and colleagues rated unsatisfactory, including some from the heavyweights of the media world.

For instance, a 2006 story in the New York Times about the effect of resveratrol (a component of red wine) on mice failed to point out that results in mice often have little bearing on what happens in humans.

In another example, the Web site took NBC's Today Show to task for a story titled "Mini-Medical Miracles: Getting Rid of Wrinkles," which it called "a classic case of disease-mongering." The story was part of a series looking at "treatments" for such things as baldness, insomnia, and dandruff.

The Web site reports its reviews both to the public (at www.healthnewsreview.org) and directly to reporters and editors, Schwitzer said.

In an accompanying editorial, the journal's editors said the "alarming report card of the trouble with medical news stories is thus a wake-up call for all of us involved in disseminating health research."

The editorial said that researchers, journalists, and medical journals themselves are often complicit in over-hyping a story, but there are signs that matters are improving.

The journal cited coverage of the growing field of genetic research, which might seem a ripe field for sensationalism. Instead, an analysis of "627 newspaper articles on gene discoveries found that only 11% contained such hype," the editorial said.

The review Web site is a step in the direction of better health coverage, although "a small step," said freelance journalist Andrew Holtz, M.P.H., of Portland, Ore., who is past president of the Association of Health Care Journalists.

Holtz said some editors and reporters "will just blow it off" but a growing number "want to do better and are hungry for some guidance." The 10-point rating system offers that guidance, he said.

"How can you make progress if you don't measure?" he said.

The study was supported by the Foundation for Informed Medical Decision Making. Schwitzer reported no conflicts. One of the Web site's reviewers, Colin Nelson, has contributed articles to MedPage Today.

If you are pregnant or planning to become pregnant avoid all artificial sweeteners, even thought the American Dietetic Association tells you otherwise. Aspartame is known to cause severe birth defects. Splenda's hydrongenated chlorocarbon nature can be damaging as well.

Direct and indirect cellular effects of aspartame on the brain

P Humphries1,2, E Pretorius1 and H Naude´11Department of Anatomy, University of Pretoria, Pretoria, Gauteng, South Africa and 2Department of Anatomy, University of the Limpopo, South Africa

The use of the artificial sweetener, aspartame, has long been contemplated and studied by various researchers, and people are concerned about its negative effects. Aspartame is composed of phenylalanine (50%), aspartic acid (40%) and methanol (10%).Phenylalanine plays an important role in neurotransmitter regulation, whereas aspartic acid is also thought to play a role as an excitatory neurotransmitter in the central nervous system. Glutamate, asparagines and glutamine are formed from their precursor, aspartic acid. Methanol, which forms 10% of the broken down product, is converted in the body to formate, which can either be excreted or can give rise to formaldehyde, diketopiperazine (a carcinogen) and a number of other highly toxic derivatives. Previously, it has been reported that consumption of aspartame could cause neurological and behavioural disturbances in sensitive individuals. Headaches, insomnia and seizures are also some of the neurological effects that have been encountered, and these may be accredited to changes in regional brain concentrations of catecholamines, which include norepinephrine, epinephrine and dopamine. The aim of this study was to discuss the direct and indirect cellular effects of aspartame on the brain, and we propose that excessive aspartame ingestion might be involved in the pathogenesis of certain mental disorders (DSM-IV-TR 2000) and also in compromised learning and emotional functioning.

Tuesday, May 27, 2008

Often times women utilize birth control hormone products to off put pregnancy. Many do not know of the severe nutritional imbalances created by use of these products.

Adding to the problem, physicians or others who Rx birth control pills for a myriad of complaints such as acne or cyclic balancing are contributing to a long term problem that may be a major factor in PPD. That problem is nutritional deficiency.

Brooke Shields might wish to do a bit more research before supporting her notion that SSRI anti-depressants are able to support true core healing from PPD.

As I have said for decades, nutrition - especially intracellular nutrition - should be the focus of treatment.

And for all the push to pre-treat pregnant women with SSRIs to prevent PPD, even with articles now claiming that these drugs cause no harm to a fetus, I wonder what has happened to the tenent - especially for the first tri-mester - use no drugs...

From an article on my women's health page -

"Oral contraceptives may create certain nutrient deficiencies and excesses as well as increase the nutritional needs of the user. Most of the B vitamins, particularly pyridoxine (B6) and folic acid, are needed in higher amounts when birth control pills are taken. The copper level usually rises, and zinc levels often fall. Thus, more zinc is needed as well. An increased need for vitamins C, E, and K may also result from the use of birth control pills."

POST-PARTUM DEPRESSION - (PPD) has been much in the news, including movie star Brooke Shields’public announcement that she struggled with PPD and took anti-depressants to treat the condition. Now, new research sheds light on what may be the underlying cause of the condition, and may help explain why some women suffer more extreme cases of PPD.

Researchers have identified a pattern of elevated copper levels in the blood of women with a history of the condition. “In our study, we looked at zinc and copper levels in 78 women who suffered from PPD after completed pregnancies, and compared them with a group of 148 mothers without a history of PPD, and also with a group of 28 non-depressed women,” said John Crayton, M.D. Dr. Crayton is a professor of psychiatry at Loyola University Stritch School of Medicine, Maywood, Ill. and the Section on Biological Psychiatry, Hines VA Hospital, Hines, Ill.

Copper levels and copper to zinc ratios were significantly higher in the group of women with a history of PPD compared to the other groups, according to the study published in the February issue of the Journal of Trace Elements in Medicine and Biology.

“The exact nature of the association between elevated copper and PPD is not yet known, but copper plays a role in a variety of physiological systems that may be implicated in the development of PPD,” said William Walsh, PhD. Dr. Walsh is founder and director of research at the Pfeiffer Treatment Center and the Health Research Institute, Warrenville, Ill., and a coauthor of the study. Walsh added that elevated copper in the brain tends to diminish dopamine and increase norepinephrine levels.

"Zinc and copper play important roles in brain chemistry and are present in high concentrations in brain hippocampus which is involved in mood regulation, short-term memory, and behavior control," Dr. Crayton said.

During the nine months of a normal pregnancy, blood copper levels increase more than 100% but quickly return to normal after birth. This study indicates that the high copper condition can persist for many years in PPD women.

“We have seen dramatic improvement in women with PPD when we treat them withsupplements that lower copper levels and restore a normal copper to zinc ratio,” said Dr. Walsh.

“The next step is a controlled, clinical trial to verify these results, which may lead to a more effective treatment for PPD.”

Monday, May 26, 2008

No surprise here if you understand the impact of the excessive amount of fluoride we all are exposed too. Water, dental propaganda, food, drugs, carpet, cleaning products, and the list goes on. Over exposure to radiation adds its effect. Birth control pills, other hormone therapies, antibiotics and SSRI drugs can also play a dirty hand.

The treatment you get in mainstream medicine is irradiation with a lifetime of Synthroid (leading to osteoporosis).

Never or rarely do you learn that you can recover the function of your hyperthyroid condition with natural therapies.

On the other end of the scale there are hypothyroid conditions. I am always educating people about the need for this test panel. And boy do I get a tough time from those knowing little about the thyroid.

You need at least a TSH, Free T3 and Free T4. Most times mainstream medicine folks give you a TSH. Or maybe you can get lucky with a FT4 and TSH. You get told the health care provider can "infer" the FT3 from the TSH and FT4. For my money, I don't want to infer or have anyone else infer anything about my health.

FT4 converts to FT3 and there can be issues in the conversion process.

Also make sure your lab and health care provider so know that the current TSH range of 0.3 to 3.2 has been re-established at 0.4-2.5 by the most erudite clinicians . It is usually considered to be best at about 1.5-2. The TSH should not be 8 or 5.

Sometimes a reverse T3 is important because it can indicate immune disorders.

There is other help beside Synthroid. I like Armour Natural Thyroid or Biothroid. Some people need Cytomel, which is T3. T3 can be obtained at a compounding pharmacy, another reason to tell Congress to lay their hands off these good resources.

And low functioning thyroid can he helped with natural treatment using herbs, homeopathy or supplements, and improving nutrition.

Also not to be overlooked is the interplay between thyroid function and diabetes.

Silent thyroid dysfunction has risks: study Fri May 23, 2008

People who have an underactive or overactive thyroid without symptoms appear to have a modestly increased risk of heart disease.

The data suggest that silent or "subclinical" thyroid dysfunction "might represent a potentially modifiable -- albeit modest -- risk factor for coronary heart disease and mortality," Dr. Nicholas Rodondi, from the University of Lausanne in Switzerland, and colleagues wrote in a report.

Their findings are based on pooled data from 12 studies identified through a search of MEDLINE (1950 to 2008). Ten of the studies involved population-based groups that included 14,449 subjects.

All of the population-based studies examined the impact of subclinical hypothyroidism on heart disease and mortality, whereas only five looked at the effect of subclinical hyperthyroidism, the report indicates.

The likelihood of coronary heart disease, heart-related death, and death from any cause was higher by 20 percent, 18 percent, and 12 percent, respectively, in subjects with an underactive thyroid without symptoms -- also referred to as subclinical hypothyroidism.

People with an overactive thyroid but without symptoms (i.e., silent hyperthyroidism) had a 21 percent, 19 percent, and 12 percent greater odds, respectively, of heart disease, heart-related death, and death from any cause.

Rodondi and colleagues say studies are needed to determine the impact of treating these two conditions on heart disease risk.

Antidepressants increased the risk compared to placebo of suicidal thinking and behavior (suicidality) in children, adolescents, and young adults in short-term studies of major depressive disorder (MDD) and other psychiatric disorders. Anyone considering the use of Celexa or any other antidepressant in a child, adolescent, or young adult must balance this risk with the clinical need. Short-term studies did not show an increase in the risk of suicidality with antidepressants compared to placebo in adults beyond age 24; there was a reduction in risk with antidepressants compared to placebo in adults aged 65 and older. Depression and certain other psychiatric disorders are themselves associated with increases in the risk of suicide. Patients of all ages who are started on antidepressant therapy should be monitored appropriately and observed closely for clinical worsening, suicidality, or unusual changes in behavior. Families and caregivers should be advised of the need for close observation and communication with the prescriber. Celexa is not approved for use in pediatric patients. (See WARNINGS: Clinical Worsening and Suicide Risk, PRECAUTIONS: Information for Patients, and PRECAUTIONS: Pediatric Use.)

In addition, Celexa is another fluoride based SSRI.

Fluoride suppresses thyroid function which can then lead to suppressed immunity.

No one is considering that the toxic load from chemo and radiation treatments as well as associated nutritional deficiencies may be the cause of the "depression".

This story speaks to the old knowledge surrounding vibrational healing

The "healing machines" created by Emery Blagdon, Nebraska native and former hobo, who was considered just another eccentric bachelor when he died in 1986. Few of his neighbors knew that, for thirty years, Blagdon had been creating a masterpiece of idiosyncratic art in his dilapidated Sand Hills farm shed. Nearly one hundred paintings and about four hundred and fifty wire sculptures, embellished with wood, ribbon, beads, tin, and plastic, filled every corner of the 800-square-foot shed, illuminated by twinkling Christmas lights. Blagdon believed that his pieces created an electromagnetic field that could treat various diseases. When asked to explain, he would simply say, "I don't know why, it just works." The rarely exhibited Blagdon pieces are on loan to the NSHS by former North Platte resident Dan Dryden.

A new EPA assessment showing significantly greater cancer risks from the solvent 1,4 dioxane -- a common contaminant at waste sites and in personal care products -- may give environmentalists greater leverage in their calls for manufacturers to remove the chemical from their products and for stricter cleanup requirements.READ FULL ARTICLE

Since that time many people, especially now, are claiming to be experts in how to detoxify your home, garden, and physiological environment (inside and out).

Like the wife of a past chiropractor of mine always says, "she foregets more than most people will ever know." Others refer to me as a "walking encyclopedia".

It is something to live up to. I try, but I truly wish that those who copy our material from this blog and out websites would be open to giving credit. We often say we are often replicated, never duplicated.

This may be no more than the fact that we really have been at this work for a lot longer than most so-called and self-proclaimed experts have been alive. But many rely on us for our expert knowledge and expert opinions.

Here is something now, again a repeat of something we cautioned over 15 years ago.

If you aren't aware, now is an opportunity.

Should you wish to know how to properly select pure essential oils for making your own sprays, and how to make them as well, we will be happy to offer a consultation for your donation. You really just can't add some essential oils to a spray bottle. Some oils can be harmful to infants and small children.

In the mean time, Dr. Bornner's Super Baby Mild is a good choice for soap and water cleaning, known since the time of Ignaz Semmelweis, to be the best choice for kiling germs. Dwell time and agitation are important too.

Why It's Best to Avoid Hand Sanitizer GelYou, Your Baby and the Environment Are Better Off with Good Old Soap and WaterMarch 3, 2008

Buzz up!

"You want some hand gel?"

The moment it was apparent I was pregnant, I started getting this question. It was asked so often it started to remind me of the drug pushers who used to hang around Washington Square Park when I was a teenager: "Smoke? Smoke?"

"No, thanks," was – is – my standard reply. I doubt at that point I had even read the specific ingredients of the most common gels (like Purell), or tried to find their material safety data sheets (MSDS) which list hazards that may not be printed on packaging. But I did already know that certain hand purifying gels contained, among other undesirables, the hormone disrupting antibacterial/antifungal agent triclosan, which can form dioxins when it comes into contact with water and has some worried it will create resistant strains of bacteria. Most people stared at me oddly or made a face when I turned the stuff down. Their sneers seemed to say, Didn't I know my hands had horrible scary germs on them that were about to kill my unborn child? I understand their fervor – I feel this way about toxic chemicals, not so much about germs. Well, actually, I am a germ freak, but these chemicals worry me more than microorganisms. I try to think about the hygiene hypothesis – that exposure to germs helps build a healthy immune system – when something dirty bothers me.

Of course when my itty bitty vulnerable newborn arrived in the world, the hand gel offerings grew a zillion-fold. Every person who came to meet her popped a bottle of the stuff out of their bags, slathered it all over their hands, then reached for her. I was horrified. This was in my apartment, mind you. They could have walked two inches to the bathroom and used soap and warm water to greater – and much safer – effect. But Americans like their products.

This across-the-board addiction to products when good old soap and water has been proven time and time again by many in the medical community to be all you need to clean hands falls into category I like to call eco-straneous. Extraneous stuff no one really needs that has negative environmental impact. I'd say hand gel fits the bill. But I'm totally outnumbered. Case in point: the natural/organic/green marketplace has recently been flooded with "organic" hand gels (the quotes are there because of course there is no regulation in place to certify something like hand purifier as organic). Which means it's time or me to get off my non-hand-gel-using butt and weigh in.

Here's what to avoid: Any of the conventional gels. The first thing that MUST be avoided is anything claiming to be antibacterial or containing triclosan. I just saw this crazy statistic in an abstract of a 2003-2004 National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey trying to assess exposure to the antibacterial:

"In about three-quarters of urine samples analyzed [there were 2,517].we detected concentrations of triclosan. Concentrations differed by age and socioeconomic status but not by race/ethnicity and sex. Specifically, the concentrations of triclosan appeared to be highest during the third decade of life and among people with the highest household incomes."

I don't want detectable levels of a hormone disrupter in my daughter's diaper!

Even the conventional ones that don't contain triclosan usually contain isopropyl alcohol, parabens, propylene glycol, and synthetic fragrances (which may contain phthalates). Nothing good about any of this.

Here are two being marketed as green and the ingredient information I could find on them. Read carefully and make your own decisions. If there's anything that confuses you, contact the manufacturer, especially if you find a product that says it contains something like "ethyl alcohol" but doesn't say if it is plant-derived or synthetic. And don't stop reading an ingredient list just because you see that someone is using an organic essential oil. EO Hand Sanitizer, for example, contains organic lavender as well as dimethicone (a silicone based polymer) and other synthetics. I'm not so fond of slathering synthetics on my kid's hands. Or my own. Would that I could just tell you which one to use. But, like I said, I don't use the stuff.

Another option is to make your own. Make a spray of water and essential oils thought to have antiseptic properties (lavender, jasmine, tuberose, thyme, tea tree oil, grapefruit seed extract). Look up a recipe and make sure to dilute enough. You don't want too much on a child's skin, or for oils to be rubbed into eyes.

Debra Lynn Dadd writes, "According to a Purdue university professor who teaches sanitation practices for food service workers, 'Waterless, antibacterial hand sanitizers are marketed as a way to 'wash your hands' when soap and water aren't available, and they are especially popular among parents of small children. But research shows that they do not significantly reduce the overall amount of bacteria on the hands, and in some cases they may even increase it.' The professor went on to say that a hand sanitizer can't take the place of old-fashioned soap and water at home or anywhere else."

Sunday, May 25, 2008

Unfortunate to know that Consumer Reports is stooping so low as to allow an article of this poor calibre to be printed on its pages, electronic and otherwise.

FDA already has approved homeopathy because it has shown no adverse efects for more than 60 years.

Its use goes back centuries. Even the Queen relies on it, and that should be a testimonial.

Even medical schools taught this and relied on such remedies, just as they relied on herbs, until Big Pharma took over with its Rockefellerian debauched mentality.

Or that Bastyr U acted greedily to block anyone except their graduates from using it to treat people, so much for over looking the strong tradition of lay homeopaths Pizzorno...

Not only do I believe in the use of homeopathy, flower essences and other vibrational medicines, I use and manufacture them (RK BioDrops).

No deaths here or adverse reporting, nor faked studies to get FDA approval and the like.

This approach is worth its weight in gold. Or maybe today we should say 'oil'.

Homeopathic remedies can cause confusion Spring is here, and if you're not careful, the Zicam you buy from a local pharmacy may not be the hay-fever medicine you expected.

The over-the-counter products Allergy Relief and Intense Sinus Relief are both made by Zicam, and both promise relief of hay-fever symptoms. But there's a big difference. Intense Sinus Relief contains oxymetazoline, a decongestant the Food and Drug Administration has found to be safe and effective. The other product is homeopathic; it hasn't been reviewed by the FDA and its active ingredients, including sulphur, have been diluted almost to the vanishing point. Yet we often found the two products in drugstores shelved alongside each other.

In fact, our 11 mystery shoppers, who visited 52 drugstores throughout the U.S., often found products labeled "homeopathic" alongside conventional over-the-counter drugs. Such product placements could lead consumers to buy a homeopathic remedy when they're really looking for a standard medicine. That not only wastes money but might also lead to inadequately treated health problems. Even people seeking homeopathic products might not get what they expected. Our check of labels found that many of the remedies might not meet the standards set by the industry's own oversight organization.

Homeopathy is a centuries-old form of medicine that takes a substance that might otherwise cause symptoms or harm and dilutes it until the substance becomes virtually undetectable. Yet homeopathy's supporters say the infinitesimal amount of active ingredients somehow improves health. Not surprisingly, there's little good evidence backing up that notion. The most comprehensive analysis of homeopathy we know of—a 2005 review published in The Lancet of 110 placebo-controlled homeopathy trials matched with 110 conventional-medicine trials—found that any benefit from homeopathic remedies was "compatible with" the placebo effect. An accompanying editorial, "The End of Homeopathy," said that the findings were less surprising than the fact that debate over homeopathy continues "despite 150 years of unfavorable findings."

While the FDA is officially required to regulate homeopathic remedies, a spokeswoman for the agency told us that in practice it doesn't review those products and thus doesn't approve them as safe and effective, partly because of "limited resources," and partly because the products are so diluted they're not thought to pose any risks.

Andy P. Bormeth, executive director of the Homeopathic Pharmacopoeia Convention of the United States, says that "official" homeopathic remedies should state "HPUS" on their labels, indicating that they conform with his organization's guidelines. But only 4 of the 12 products our mystery shoppers found included those initials on their labels.

Check whether over-the-counter products are labeled homeopathic. If they are, we think you should put them back on the shelf. There's not enough evidence to justify their use, and they may cause problems if they allow a treatable ailment to worsen. If you opt for one anyway, stick with a product labeled "HPUS." But be leery of those that include alcohol, especially for children, since the FDA does not limit how much alcohol homeopathic remedies can contain.

This article first appeared in the April 2008 issue of Consumer Reports on Health.—Doug Podolsky, senior health editor

Fluoride is neither a nutrient nor essential for healthy teeth (1-3). However, the evidence is solid that lack of essential nutrients makes teeth more decay susceptible.

Good dental health begins in the womb (4). Specifically, calcium, protein, phosphorus, vitamins A, C and D help construct babies' primary teeth, according to the American Dental Association.

Additionally, protein-calorie malnutrition, iodine deficiency and excessive fluoride increase susceptibility to dental caries, according to the U.S. Surgeon General (5).

Americans are deficient in calcium (6), magnesium (7), vitamins C (8) and D (9). No evidence indicates any American is fluoride-deficient. In fact, American children are fluoride overexposed (10).

In the past fluoride was credited with the substantial cavity decline. However, "No clear reasons for the caries decline have been identified," according to the 1999 Dental Textbook, Dentistry, Dental Practice and the Community, by Burt and Eklund.

In the past fluoride was credited with the substantial cavity decline. However, fluoridation and the explosion of fluoridated dental products coincided with many health preserving trends. For instance, milk was vitamin D fortified to prevent bone and teeth damaging rickets; cereals and breads were vitamin and mineral enriched; dental care and insurance was encouraged and affordable; and Americans became more nutritionally aware. No valid science proves fluoridation was the cavity-killing culprit.

According to a large federal study (NHANES III) children without deciduous caries experience (tooth decay in the primary teeth) had significantly higher fruit, grain, sodium, and total Healthy Eating Index's than children with deciduous caries experience while children without permanent caries experience (tooth decay in the secondary teeth) had significantly higher dairy, cholesterol, fruit, grain, sodium, variety, and total Healthy Eating Index's than children with permanent caries experience (11).

In fact, American kids who don't eat the recommended five servings of vegetables and fruits -- every day -- up their risk of cavities more than threefold (12).

Burdened with the worst oral health, U.S. children in poverty are also the least healthy, most food insecure, least likely to ingest recommended levels of vital nutrients, least likely to have dental insurance or care, and most likely to have unfilled cavities.

Is fluoridation going to help these children? Common sense and science says, no. But the American Dental Association (ADA) and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control (CDC) say yes, using claims and endorsements not backed with valid science (13).

Weston Price in Nutrition and Physical Degeneration reported long ago what dentistry needs to re-learn. Children with the best diets have the best teeth without fluoride. Children with the worst diets have the worst teeth even with fluoride.

There's a constant movement of minerals into and out of teeth. Topical Fluoride is said to enhance the re-mineralization process. Without essential minerals available, even topical fluoride is useless. Many low-income children are deficient in required tooth building and repairing nutrients, such as calcium, that also moderate fluoride's toxic effects.

Fruits and vegetables offer a substantial amount of essential nutrients which may be why vegetarians have less tooth decay (14). Only 23% of Americans comply with recommendations to eat 5 - 9 servings of fruits and vegetables, daily (15).

Maybe produce should be government subsidized to repair nutritionally starved kids instead of wasting multi-millions of dollars on fluoride and fluoridation programs each year at the local, state and federal levels. Unlike fluoridation, fruits and vegetables deliver essential nutrients that teeth and bodies require.

Well-meaning but misguided dentists thought fluoride was their magic bullet to prevent tooth decay at a time when nutrients were discovered to prevent diseases, such as vitamin C preventing scurvy. The bad news is that there's no magic bullet to cure or prevent tooth decay. The good news is that tooth decay is highly and easily preventable - with a nutritious diet and regular dental care.

13) Center for Reviews and Dissemination. 2003. What the 'York Review' on the fluoridation of drinking water really found. University of York. York, UK Originally released: October 28 2003 Available from

Friday, May 23, 2008

Vitamin B complex and its componet nutrients - from B1 through B12 - really do a body good.

In the next post you'll see my comment on the loss of nutrients beginning when whole grains began to suffer through processing. This cost much of the fiber to be lost, but most, if not all B vitamins.

B 6 is one vitamin helpful for glucose metabolism. B 1 helps insulin cross the cell wall membrane. B 12 is extremely helpful in pregnancy, to women with hypertension and both men and women with dementia. B12 also is very helpful for people with anemias and cancer.

B 4 (folate), B 6 and B12 all help the heart.

B5 and/or B2 can help with headache and migraine.

The Bs do so much more. And remember that its the B complex additive factor that helps prevent any side efects when using single Bs, especially high dose.

Based on quite a lot of the research from the days when no one blinked an eye or made you take (the wrong) blood test when you asked for a B 12 shot, I use 2400 mcg daily, or 2800 mcg daily in pregnancy and chronic disease.

ScienceDaily (2008-05-23) -- In an epidemiological study, researchers identified trends of vitamin B6 status in a sample of the United States population based on measures of plasma pyridoxal 5'- phosphate levels in the bloodstream. Some study participants demonstrated inadequate vitamin B6 status, despite consuming the Recommended Daily Allowance of vitamin B6. ... > read full article

Generally speaking and without much consideration o a comparison between these two studies, I'd opt for diet and exercise for the best benefit, initially and over the long term.

We know that for most cases of Type 2, Diabetes is a nutritional health problem.

Historically many cases developed from the time when whole grains began to be processed, removing the health promoting 'germ' of these grains.

Over processing foods and more environmental factors add to the mix.

Type I is often connected with the Hepatitis vaccine and other things that relate to immune stress. Recently, vitamin D (3) has shown very helpful. Older research shows that marshmallow root and astrgalus help mediate this problem.

In today's medicine, insulin is generally genetically engineered and this process may contribute to health problems.

Easier to eat a wholesome diet and exercise that rely on injections.

Managing monitoring is also something that cannot be over stressed, 5-6 checks a day of bllod sugar beats once or after meals.

Drinking less alcohol, eating more vegetables and exercising can prevent or delay the onset of diabetes, researchers said on Friday in a study showing that lifestyle changes can make a big difference.

Diet and exercise reduced the incidence of diabetes by about 43 percent over 20 years among 577 high-risk Chinese adults, the researchers reported in the journal Lancet.

At the end of the 20 years, 80 percent of those who changed what they ate and exercised more had diabetes, compared with 93 percent who made no changes, said Guangwei Li of the China-Japan Friendship Hospital in Beijing and Ping Zhang at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The findings came as part of a series of studies addressing new research about diabetes, which affects 246 million adults worldwide, and accounts for 6 percent of all global deaths.

"The challenge is to translate research findings into substantial clinical improvements for patients. Although prospects are hopeful, they are not assured," the Lancet wrote in a commentary.

Type 2 diabetes accounts for about 90 percent of all diabetes cases and is closely linked to obesity and physical inactivity. Type 1 diabetes is an auto-immune disease often diagnosed at an early age.

The International Diabetes Federation estimates more than 380 million people will have a form of diabetes by 2025 as more developing nations adopt a Western lifestyle.

The researchers followed 577 Chinese adults at risk of diabetes over a 20-year period to see how prodding people to change their lifestyles could affect their health.

The volunteers were assigned to either a control group or one of three groups that included an improved diet, better exercise or a combination of both.

The researchers did not say what specific foods or amount of exercise contributed to the health improvements but said the findings provide an effective strategy to deal with a disease that kills about 3 million people worldwide each year.

"This study has shown that ... group-based interventions targeting lifestyle changes such as diet and exercise produce a durable and long-lasting reduction in incidence of type 2 diabetes," the researchers wrote.

Another team reported that insulin infusions or multiple daily injections given early to people with newly diagnosed type 2 diabetes helped the body's insulin-producing cells and restored blood sugar control faster than standard pills.

Too much glucose, or blood sugar, in the blood -- a hallmark of diabetes -- can damage the eyes and kidneys, and also leads to heart disease, stroke and limb amputations.

Act early to blunt long-term impact of diabetes: study Thu May 22, 2008

Aggressive insulin treatment or lifestyle changes at the onset of diabetes can sharply curb the incidence and impact of the disease over the long haul, according to two studies released Friday.

Intensive insulin therapy through daily injections for Type 2 diabetes, which affects some 250 million people worldwide, is typically started late in the course of the disease.

But researchers in China found that if this treatment is undertaken before the body loses the ability to control sugar levels in the blood -- a condition known as glycaemia -- patients recover normal levels faster and are less at risk of remission.

Type 2 diabetes can cause conditions ranging from kidney failure to blindness and heart disease, and complications can lead to death.

The condition, strongly linked to obesity, occurs when the liver fails to produce enough insulin or becomes resistant to the hormone, which controls blood sugar levels.

A team led by Jianping Weng of Sun Yat-Sen University in Guangzhou divided nearly 400 patients aged 25 to 70 with Type 2 diabetes into three groups.

Two received intensive insulin therapy, either through an under-the-skin drip or multiple daily injections. The third was given standard oral diabetic drugs.

Treatment was stopped when regular blood glucose control had been restored for two weeks, after which patients regulated sugar levels through diet and exercise alone.

The study, published in the British journal The Lancet, found that more patients in the two insulin-intensive groups hit normal levels, and did so faster, in four to six days rather than nine, compared to the control group.

As significant, remission rates -- the number of patients whose blood sugar remained at acceptable levels -- were nearly twice as high in the first two groups.

The second study, led by Guangwei Li of the China-Japan Friendship Hospital in Beijing and also published in The Lancet, showed that a controlled diet and exercise over six years prevented or delayed diabetes onset by up to an additional 14 years.

Previous studies have shown the efficacy of lifestyle changes in controlling diabetes, but questions remained on the long-term impact.

Li found that a monitored diet coupled with physical activity halved the incidence of diabetes during the six years of intervention, and by 43 percent over 20 years.

Type 2 diabetes has become rampant in both developed and developing countries as a result of traditional diets being abandoned for processed and junk foods and people getting less exercise. Once a disease that affected only adults, it has become common among obese adolescents as well.

The International Diabetes Federation forecasts the number of cases -- including many adolescents -- will explode from 246 million today to 380 million by 2025.

A less common form of diabetes called Type 1 is caused by permanent destruction of insulin-producing beta cells in the pancreas, and usually occurs early in life. It is lethal unless treated with insulin.

I grew up with hot pepper vinegar only because I have family that hails from the Deep South. Afterall, what would greens and black eyed peas be without this spicy liquid?

This is more likely than not why I have an affinity for Gongurra, a similarly hot condiment from India.

Once, while on a project in Olympia, WA for the health department, I was visiting a friend who worked for the DSHS Indian Desk. He had this enticing bottle of hot (so he said) chiles on his desk. I asked for a few. He looked at me and said he did not think I would like them. Well, I twisted his arm enough to get a handful and ate them with relish. All the whilg his amazement as I chewed, not shedding a tear or wincing a smidge. Truth is, at least for me, they weren't that hot.

I'm still eating these little gems, and my two dogs enjoy them as well.

Here is something very old they would like you to believe is new. How about them apples?

ScienceDaily (2008-05-22) -- You can now not only feel the spicy kick of a jalapeno pepper, you can also see it in full 3-D, thanks to researchers at Baylor College of Medicine. Using sophisticated equipment, the researchers generated the first three dimensional view of the protein that allows you to sense the heat of a hot pepper. ... > read full article

The Food and Drug Administration has been under increasing pressure to develop a comprehensive drug surveillance system since the painkiller Vioxx was pulled from the market in 2004 after it was linked to increased risk of stroke and heart attack.

New regulations announced Thursday by the Health and Human Services Department will enable the FDA, states and academic researchers to screen the Medicare claims data. Under the regulation, the Medicare data can be made available in 30 days.

Medicare beneficiaries use an average of 28 prescriptions a year, and those who consider themselves in poor health have an average of 45 prescriptions annually, giving investigators a huge database of health records to tap into.

Officials said they no longer would have to wait years to see how a drug or medical device affects millions of people.

"The era of wait and see is going to become the era of tell me right now," the FDA commissioner, Dr. Andrew von Eschenbach, said.

The Institute of Medicine recommended creation of such a surveillance system in 2006. Personally identifying information will stay inside the Medicare agency and will not be part of the information that the FDA and others look at, officials said.

The FDA primarily relies on physicians and patients to report suspected adverse events. Often, it takes a number of cases before someone at the agency detects a pattern that's worth investigating. Then it conducts an investigation to determine whether the side effects were caused by the drug. At the first hint of trouble, the FDA now will be able to query databases involving tens of millions of patients. It will not only be able to see the medications used, but also whether a patient had lab work done or whether they had to be hospitalized.

The first batch of records the agency will have at its disposal will be from 25 million Medicare beneficiaries. Later, private companies will contribute medical data, Health and Human Services Secretary Mike Leavitt said.

"We're moving from a reactive dependence on voluntary reporting of product safety concerns to a proactive surveillance of medical products currently on the market," Leavitt said.

Officials provided only general details about the cost of enacting what the FDA has labeled the Sentinel Initiative. The agency is hiring more staff, but it won't need a large new computer system, officials said. That's because agencies such as the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services will use their own computer systems to do the data-mining. The FDA will simply provide the questions while Medicare's computers supply the answer.

Medicare officials said the program could end up reducing the government's health costs if it can cut down on adverse drug events. The cost of treating preventable adverse events in Medicare comes to about $900 million a year. Also, officials said they will be able to determine when a drug is being inappropriately dispensed to treat certain conditions. By promoting best practices in therapy management, agency officials said they hope to cut down on unnecessary prescription bills.

Dr. Mark McClellan, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution and a former Medicare administrator, said the new data mining system was actually a good model for maintaining patient privacy. The personal data stays where it was, with an insurer or within a medical practice, or within Medicare. The FDA doesn't need personally identifying information to help it monitor medical practices, he said.

"You don't have to share with the FDA a whole lot of detailed personal information about each case," McClellan said. "What FDA mainly needs to know is what's going on in the population being treated by all these different components of our health care system."

Rep. Rosa DeLauro, D-Conn., said she was glad the FDA was laying the groundwork for the surveillance system. But she said the effort has taken too long and that it's still just in the planning stages.

Von Eschenbach said a pilot project allowing the FDA to look at Medicare data could begin after 30 days.

"We're here today not to simply announce a concept, but to launch what is the next phase for the FDA in post-market surveillance," he said.___

The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration is the latest regulator to warn against certifying people using the smoking cessation aid. The Federal Administration banned the drug for pilots and air traffic controllers after a study linked Chantix to seizures, dizziness, heart irregularities and diabetes.

In its warning issued Thursday the FMCSA advised medical examiners "to not qualify anyone currently using this medication for commercial motor vehicle licenses," The Wall Street Journal reported Friday. The FMCSA oversees the interstate trucking and bus industry.

A U.S. Food and Drug Administration spokeswoman said the agency was focusing on likely links between Chantix and neuropsychiatric side effects. This year, the FDA and Pfizer, which manufactures the drug, updated warnings on Chantix's label to include depression and thoughts of suicide.

The Institute for Safe Medication Practices, a non-profit watchdog group in Horsham, Pa., conducted the Chantix study that reported the drug was linked to more than 900 serious episodes in the last quarter of 2007.

Pfizer said the report's findings weren't inconsistent with possible side effects listed on drug's label.

I grew up in a home where both parents smoked for many years, my father stopping only when I was in my teens. My mother continued to smoke until she was in her 90s, and did so only after a closed head injury placed her in someone else's care. She always smoked Philip Morris.

Influenced by this, as probably my asthma as a child was, and differences in social norms at the time, I was a very light smoker of brands like Gauloise and Camel straights. But them I am sort of known as one "gutsy babe". Maybe it was an intellectuals thing too.

I quit smoking many decades ago, by the pure and simple cold turkey method. At that time we were not overloaded with ads for drugs, patches, other Rx, dial up support lines or web sites offering counseling to help us quit.

I do know the risks and hazards of smoking, and second hand smoke. I also know it does not seem to bother all people, my mother being an example.

In one instance it caused a great amount of harm to a dear friend of mine. I tried for years to encourage her to stop smoking. She always had a reason why she couldn't until she was diagnosed with congestive heart failure. I saw the report from her workup along with labs and other relevant data. It was scary to me and I really wondered how she made it day by day.

At last she has quit smoking. And she is very glad she did.

She used nicotine patches. She was worried about another friend we have that used Chantix.

A popular series of articles on this blog are ones I posted late in 2007 and early 2008 about the risks of Chantix as an aid to stopping smoking.

Now today we find out more.

In years passed airline pilots were banned from using any products with aspartame because it is known to cause seizure or other reactions that could put passengers and crew at risk.

Today the FAA has banned the use of Chantix by pilots and flight controllers.

If you are considering stopping the use of tobacco, including chew, you might want to consider that Chantix is not something you want to use in your plan.

Help in this process is something we have done for many years, using the natural approach. Contact us to find out more.

Varenicline (Chantix) Off the Table for Pilots and ControllersBy Marianne Mattera, Managing Editor, MedPage TodayPublished: May 21, 2008Reviewed by Robert Jasmer, MD; Associate Clinical Professor of Medicine, University of California, San Francisco

WASHINGTON, May 21 -- Citing "a wide range of issues," the Federal Aviation Administration has barred pilots and air traffic controllers from using the smoking cessation drug varenicline (Chantix).

A spokesperson said the agency would be sending a letter detailing the decision to the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association, the Air Line Pilots Association, and those it knows to be taking the drug, including 150 pilots and 30 controllers.

The letter will advise recipients to stop taking the drug immediately, and it prohibits them from work for 72 hours after the last dose.

The FAA action was taken following a report from the Institute for Safe Medication Practices, a drug watchdog group. The group reported that in the fourth quarter of 2007, varenicline was implicated in 988 events reported to the FDA. These included serious accidents and falls, potentially lethal cardiac rhythm disturbances, severe skin reactions, acute myocardial infarction, seizures, diabetes, psychosis, aggression, and suicide.

In February, the FDA confirmed 39 suicides among persons using varenicline.

Overall the FDA said it had 420 confirmed reports of mood changes, including anxiety, nervousness, depressed mood, tension, and suicidal behavior or suicidal thoughts.

At the same time, the FDA reiterated its stance that the drug was an effective smoking-cessation agent, but indicated that the agency is continuing its review of the drug.

The FDA said that Pfizer, which makes varenicline, estimated that about five million people have used the drug since it was approved in May 2006, suggesting that the event rate was low (See: FDA Approves Smoking-Cessation Drug).

In January, Pfizer changed the drug's label to reflect the FDA alert.

The FDA said physicians should carefully monitor patients for behavioral and mood changes and warned that persons using the drug should immediately report such symptoms to their physicians.

Varenicline works by partially blocking the alpha4-beta2 nicotinic receptor in the brain, which is the brain's main nicotine receptor. Within 10 to 19 seconds of a single puff from a cigarette, nicotine attaches to this receptor. The receptor, in turn, triggers large increases in dopamine, which rewards the smoker with a pleasurable sensation.

While I am sure both Madonna and Stone are reasonably intelligent women, I am not sure I understand why they are not raising money for treatment that could help thousands of suffering people, cost little money, and attack a serious (yet known to be manufacturered) health problem effectively.

There are several other posts here about the help offered by four nutritonal supplements.

Dear Sharon, Dear Madonna,

Step up and use some of that money to supply these four supplements and stop some suffering.

Thursday, May 22, 2008

For a very long time, probably since my 40 something daughters were tiny babes, I have been using natural personal care products, natural cleaning products and natural garden products (including the ones I make myself from plant I grow - see my book, "My Happy Garden") and avoiding the use of pharmaceuticals.

I realize I have been following the tenents of Green Living for much longer than most have heard of it, but hopefully this will help you understand more about why you need to do this too.

ScienceDaily (2008-05-19) -- People's concern in maintaining germ-free homes has led to the widespread use of anti-bacterial soaps and cleaning agents. But the active ingredients of those products have come under scrutiny due to environmental and human health concerns. Now, researchers have shown that antimicrobial ingredients used a half a century ago persist today in estuarine sediments into which New York City and Baltimore have discharged their treated domestic wastewater. ... > read full article

Perhaps those of us who were actively engaged in the peaceful actions during the 1960s were benefitting from incense.

More love, less war.

Burning Incense Is Psychoactive

ScienceDaily (May 20, 2008) — Religious leaders have contended for millennia that burning incense is good for the soul. Now, biologists have learned that it is good for our brains too. An international team of scientists, including researchers from Johns Hopkins University and the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, describe how burning frankincense (resin from the Boswellia plant) activates poorly understood ion channels in the brain to alleviate anxiety or depression. This suggests that an entirely new class of depression and anxiety drugs might be right under our noses.

"In spite of information stemming from ancient texts, constituents of Bosweilla had not been investigated for psychoactivity," said Raphael Mechoulam, one of the research study's co-authors. "We found that incensole acetate, a Boswellia resin constituent, when tested in mice lowers anxiety and causes antidepressive-like behavior. Apparently, most present day worshipers assume that incense burning has only a symbolic meaning."

To determine incense's psychoactive effects, the researchers administered incensole acetate to mice. They found that the compound significantly affected areas in brain areas known to be involved in emotions as well as in nerve circuits that are affected by current anxiety and depression drugs. Specifically, incensole acetate activated a protein called TRPV3, which is present in mammalian brains and also known to play a role in the perception of warmth of the skin. When mice bred without this protein were exposed to incensole acetate, the compound had no effect on their brains.

"Perhaps Marx wasn't too wrong when he called religion the opium of the people: morphine comes from poppies, cannabinoids from marijuana, and LSD from mushrooms; each of these has been used in one or another religious ceremony." said Gerald Weissmann, M.D., Editor-in-Chief of The FASEB Journal. "Studies of how those psychoactive drugs work have helped us understand modern neurobiology. The discovery of how incensole acetate, purified from frankincense, works on specific targets in the brain should also help us understand diseases of the nervous system. This study also provides a biological explanation for millennia-old spiritual practices that have persisted across time, distance, culture, language, and religion--burning incense really does make you feel warm and tingly all over!"

According to the National Institutes of Health, major depressive disorder is the leading cause of disability in the United States for people ages 15--44, affecting approximately 14.8 million American adults. A less severe form of depression, dysthymic disorder, affects approximately 3.3 million American adults. Anxiety disorders affect 40 million American adults, and frequently co-occur with depressive disorders.--------------------------------------------------------------------------------Journal reference:Incensole acetate, an incense component, elicits psychoactivity by activating TRPV3 channels in the brain. Arieh Moussaieff, Neta Rimmerman, Tatiana Bregman, Alex Straiker, Christian C. Felder, Shai Shoham, Yoel Kashman, Susan M. Huang, Hyosang Lee, Esther Shohami, Ken Mackie, Michael J. Caterina, J. Michael Walker, Ester Fride, and Raphael Mechoulam. Published online before print May 20, 2008 as doi: 10.1096/fj.07-101865. [link]

Adapted from materials provided by Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology.Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology (2008, May 20). Burning Incense Is Psychoactive: New Class Of Antidepressants Might Be Right Under Our Noses. ScienceDaily. Retrieved May 22, 2008, from http://www.sciencedaily.com­ /releases/2008/05/080520110415.htm

In light of the diagnosis of chronic fatigue showing up in young children, need I say more?

from the UK, Daily Mail 19.5.08 by Vanessa Allen. (shortened)

Pregnant women who use mobile phones are 80% more likely to have children with behavioural problems. Using mobiles before the age of 7 also puts children at risk.

The study, the first of its kind in the world, covered over 13,000 women. Children whose mothers used a mobile just 2 or 3 x a day were 25% more at risk of emotional problems & 35% more likely to by hyperactive. This risk increased with the amount of phone use & potential radiation. Experts said the results were particularly significant as one of the study's authors has been a leading sceptic over claims that mobile phones were a health risk.

Prof. Leeka Kheifets of University of California, Los Angeles, had previously written there was 'no proof of any adverse health effect.' But she & her 3 co-authors concluded that there did appear to be an association between mobile phone exposure & behavioural problems.

The research conducted jointly with academics in Aarhus, Denmark, is due to be published in "Epidemiology" journal in July. Previous studies have shown mobile phone radiation can affect the levels of melatonin, a sleep-controlling hormone that mothers pass to unborn babies through the placenta.

Wednesday, May 21, 2008

Is this a tell tale fluoride sign or vaccine reaction? Maybe WIFI and cell phones in school or at home? And don't forget that Digital TV is coming soon!

By Will Boggs, MD

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) May 16 - Chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS) can be diagnosed in children aged 11 years and younger, according to a report in the May issue of the Archives of Disease in Childhood.

"CFS/ME (myalgic encephalomyelitis) exists in these young children," Dr. Esther Crawley told Reuters Health. "It is important that physicians are aware of this, because the prognosis is good if physicians make a diagnosis."

Dr. Crawley from the Centre for Child and Adolescent Health, Cotham Hill, UK and Dr. S. Davies from Southmead Hospital, Bristol, UK describe 32 younger children who presented with CFS while at primary school and compared them to children aged 12 years or older who presented with CFS during the same time frame.

Three of the younger children were under 5 years old, the report indicates, and the youngest child with CFS was 2 years old. There were more female (68%) than male children with CFS.

Children under age 12 were severely affected, the authors report, with a mean school attendance of just over 40% and a mean Chalder fatigue score of 8.3 on a scale where maximum fatigue is 11.

All patients had post-exertional malaise, and most had unrefreshing sleep (96%) and subjective memory impairment (80%).

Fatigue, anxiety, pain, functional disability, number of symptoms, time at school, and time to assessment did not differ significantly between the younger and older patient groups, the researchers note.

Twenty-four of 26 younger children with complete symptom lists would have met the stricter adult criteria for CFS published by the Centers for Disease Control, the investigators say.

"Some of these children present with chronic headache or chronic abdominal pain," Dr. Crawley explained. "If physicians think about fatigue, they may be able to make the correct diagnosis earlier and help these children sooner."

"The epidemiology suggests that only 1 in 10 get a diagnosis and we are looking at why this is," Dr. Crawley added. "We are also looking at factors that predict outcome."

Knowing that electronic records have easily been hacked, I would raise concern about leanding your very private information to Google or Miscrosoft.

I may take a broader view than someone who is willing to give up safety and privacy for convenience.

For more information you might wish ro refer to SPYCHIPS by Albrecht and McIntyre.

Google makes health service publicly available By RACHEL METZ, AP Business WriterMon May 19, 2008

Google's online filing cabinet for medical records opened to the public Monday, giving users instant electronic access to their health histories while reigniting privacy concerns.

Called Google Health, the service lets users link information from a handful of pharmacies and care providers, including Quest Diagnostics labs. Google plans to add more.

Similar offerings include Microsoft Corp.'s HealthVault and Revolution Health, which is backed by AOL co-founder Steve Case.

Google Health differentiates itself from the pack through its user interface and things like the public availability of its application program interface, or API, said Marissa Mayer, the Google executive overseeing the service.

Mary Adams, 45, a Cleveland Clinic patient who participated in the Google Health pilot, said that she was initially concerned about the privacy of her medical information.

Still, she felt safe enough to enroll and has been using the service for about six months, linking it with an online health management tool from the Cleveland Clinic and adding information on prescriptions and doctors to her online profile.

"I hate pieces of paper lying around my house, so I love the fact that i can log on with my normal Google login info and see everything at a glance," she said, adding that with its public availability she'll try to get her sister to use it.

The service, still a non-final "beta" version, does not include ads. But Mayer said Google doesn't plan to start placing them to support the site. A search box on Google Health pages leads to standard Google search results pages, where there are advertisements.

Besides importing records from providers, users can enhance their password-protected profiles with details such as allergies and medications, they can search for doctors and they can locate Web-based health-related tools.

Mountain View-based Google Inc. views its expansion into health records management as logical because its search engine already processes millions of requests from people trying to find information about injuries, illnesses and recommended treatments.

Before this public launch, Google stored medical records for a few thousand patient volunteers at the nonprofit Cleveland Clinic.

The health venture provides fodder for privacy watchdogs who believe Google already has too much about the interests and habits of its users in its logs of search requests and its vaults of e-mail archives.

Pam Dixon, executive director of the World Privacy Forum, said services like Google Health are troublesome because they aren't covered by the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, or HIPAA.

Dixon's group issued a cautionary report on the topic in February on such third-party services.

Passed in 1996, HIPAA set strict standards for the security of medical records. Among other things, the law requires anyone seeking a patient's records by subpoena to notify the patient and give the patient an opportunity to fight the request.

By transferring records to an external service, patients could unwittingly make it easier for the government, a legal adversary or a marketing concern to obtain private information, Dixon said.

"We are in uncharted territory here. A privacy policy, I don't think, is enough to protect what needs to be protected in a doctor-patient record," Dixon said.

Mayer said, however, that users medical records "are generally speaking as safe with Google as they would be with a HIPAA-regulated entity."

During a webcast Monday, she said users' health information is stored at Google's "highest level of security" on computers that are more secure than those used for the company's search functions.

Mayer said in an interview with The Associated Press that Google will not aggregate users' health information across services so activity on the health service will not show up in search results.

The matter of harm from nanotechnology was raised many years ago, yet industry seems to be pursuing the science with gusto.

Nano-fibres lead to pre-cancer symptoms in mice: study Tue May 20, 2008

Scientists delivered a warning Tuesday about nanotechnology after tests on lab rodents found that microscopic, needle-like fibres that are already in commercial use led to lesions similar to those caused by asbestos.

In experiments, researchers led by Ken Donaldson of the University of Edinburgh, Scotland, exposed the mesothelium lining that swathes the lungs, the abdomen and the heart to fibres measuring billionths of a metre.

The fibres resulted in the same kind of inflammation and scarring, called granulomas, that are caused by exposure to asbestos, their study said.

"The granulomas and the inflammation are extremely strong indicators of mesothelioma," the cancer that attacks the body cavity's lining, said co-author Andrew Maynard.

If the mice had been allowed to carry on living, cancer would most probably have developed where the fibres were present, he told AFP.

A large body of research already exists about the potential of nanoscale fibres to attack the lungs.

But this is the first study to show that a form of nano-technology called carbon nanotubes can have the same damaging impact on the mesothelium.

Nanotubes -- structures engineered from single atoms and molecules -- hold great promise for applications in medicine, electronics and especially new materials.

"We are at the very, very beginning of using these materials commercially," said Maynard, who predicted that within half a dozen years the market for carbon nanotubes would be worth billions of dollars.

"Great caution must be exercised before introducing such products into the market if long-term harm is to be avoided," he said.

Investigation is urgently needed to see whether these tiny particles can be breathed in from air, and if they can migrate to within the lungs to cause cancer, he added.

The biggest potential danger is probably in the work place, but nanotubes might also escape into the environment once the products containing them wind up in landfills as refuse, he said.

"We don't have enough evidence to call for a moratorium, but there is very urgent need to for action to ensure safety, by government and by industry," Maynard said.

The research, published online in the British journal Nature Nanotechnology, showed that only so-called long carbon nanotubes, and not short ones, caused the pre-cancerous symptoms.

Further experiments are needed, however, to determine if short nanotubes are entirely safe.

Here's a chance to encourage your members of Congress to do something good for a change.

Lawmakers call on drug companies to curb adsTue May 20, 2008

Two top Democratic lawmakers called on several drug companies on Tuesday to voluntarily curb advertisements targeting consumers, including withholding any ads for new products for two years.

In a letter to the chief executives of Merck & Co Inc, Pfizer Inc, Johnson & Johnson and Schering-Plough Corp,

Reps. John Dingell and Bart Stupak

asked the companies to also refrain from marketing products to consumers until certain studies are completed.

The Michigan Democrats are investigating whether companies are misleading potential patients through television commercials and other direct-to-consumer advertisements.

"To date, we have not received adequate assurances that the leading pharmaceutical companies share our commitment to providing consumers with accurate information about drug therapies," Dingell, head of the U.S. House of Representatives Energy and Commerce Committee, said in a statement on Tuesday.

The letters come less than two weeks after the committee's health panel questioned lower executives from the drugmakers about aggressive marketing tactics for two cholesterol drugs -- Pfizer's Lipitor and Merck and Schering-Plough's Vytorin joint venture.

Some might want to consider this when thinking about hybrid gasoline-electric cars. The magnetic field energy is identified as a health risk. Here is a study that will try to identify what the concerns are.

If you care considering MRI for cancer screening you might want to get you list of questions together and ask those all important questions.

The Health Protection Agency (HPA) study is likely to focus mainly on the impact on health workers who regularly operate the machines.

MRI scans have been hailed as a significant step forward in the diagnosis of medical conditions.

But there is concern exposure to the magnetic fields they create may produce adverse long term health effects.

The exposures to patients and medical staff from the magnetic fields can be high and there is a shortage of information on possible adverse long term health effects Sir William Stewart, Health Protection Agency

Sir William Stewart, HPA chairman, said: "MRI scanning has some undoubted benefits in medicine, especially as an aid to accurate clinical diagnosis.

"However we need to bear in mind that the magnetic fields produced by the machines are quite substantial and that these fields are increasing in order to achieve improved clarity of image.

"The exposures to patients and medical staff from the magnetic fields can be high and there is a shortage of information on possible adverse long term health effects."

The announcement follows a recommendation by an independent board of experts, which said there was a pressing need to investigate whether regular exposure to the magnetic fields produced by MRI scanners could raise the risk of cancer and other diseases.

Clear images

MRI, first developed 30 years ago, is based on a well established scientific technique, nuclear magnetic resonance, which uses the interaction of magnetic fields with the spin of the nuclei of atoms to provide detailed information on the constituents of chemicals and biological materials.

The technique can provide excellent, detailed images of the body's soft tissue and is an alternative to using X-ray techniques such as computed tomography (CT).

MRI does not use ionising radiation and this can be a distinct advantage for examinations of children or for abdominal examinations where radiation doses can be high.

However, MRI requires large magnetic fields for successful scanning - bigger than those commonly used in industry.

The European Parliament was due to vote on new rules to limit exposure to powerful electromagnetic fields earlier this year.

But following advice from doctors, who said the proposed limits were so low they could prevent the use of MRI scanners, the issue was placed on the back burner.

While the quackwatcher's continue on their frivolous campaign to discount effective remedies and treatments science seems to show they are out in left field more often than not.

I've been in support of using silver remedies for decades, since the early years of my career in nursing. In the 1970s I was in charge of a burn center at a major hospital in Philadelphia. We used silver based therapy daily.

In the 90s information on my web site was attacked because of identifying silver as a therapy for SARS and other immune dis-orders.

ScienceDaily (May 21, 2008) — A silver-coated endotracheal tube may reduce infections with highly resistant bacteria over traditional tubes by nearly half, according to the results of a large randomized trial to be presented at the American Thoracic Society's 2008 International Conference in Toronto on May 19.

Patients who are on ventilators are often at risk for developing ventilator-associated pneumonia (VAP) because of resistant bacteria.

"VAP is a serious disease with significant mortality," said lead investigator, Andrew Shorr, M.D., M.P.H., of Washington Hospital Center in Washington, D.C. "Crude mortality rates from VAP approach 25 to 30 percent and VAP rates are now thought to reflect hospital quality. These infections include highly resistant pathogens, such as methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus or MRSA, which are the most troubling ones and often the hardest to treat. The average costs associated with treatment of VAP exceed $40,000 because of the impact on length of stay in the ICU."

To test the efficacy of the silver-coated tube in preventing infections, the study included a modified intention-to-treat population of 1,509 subjects, balanced between traditional endotracheal tubes and the silver coated ones. The researchers used brochoavelolar lavage fluid cultures to ascertain the presence of pathogenic organisms and classified as "highly resistant" organisms MRSA, Pseudomonas aeruginosa (PA) and Acinetobacter bumanii (AB).

They found that VAP in all its forms was reduced by nearly 40 percent in the population with the silver-coated endotracheal tubes and that highly resistant infections were less than half as likely to occur in those with the silver-coated tubes.

"What we show in this present analysis is that the silver-coated breathing tube prevents infections due to the most highly resistant pathogens. Other prevention strategies for VAP have not always been shown to impact the rates of infection with these highly resistant strains," said Dr. Shorr. "Given the importance of MRSA, PA and AB in the ICU, utilization of the silver-coated endotracheal tube may help contain the spread of antimicrobial resistance."--------------------------------------------------------------------------------American Thoracic Society (2008, May 21). Silver-coated Endotracheal Tube Dramatically Reduces Resistant Infections. ScienceDaily. Retrieved May 21, 2008, from http://www.sciencedaily.com­ /releases/2008/05/080519133449.htm

With the recent announcement of Teddy Kennedy's diagnosis of malignant brain cancer several thoughts have crossed my mind.

One is that this announcement raises the awareness about this type of cancer. This is good for several reasons, no so good for others.

Not too many months ago Senator Kennedy sponsored a bill in the senate that passed into law. The bill gave many more millions to the FDA, and agency already dysfunctional and failing at protecting the public. It also showed disregard for the rights of millions of our country's citizens' right to free choice in health care and options outside mainstream medicine(MSM).

I wrote Senator Kennedy and asked how much he received from Big Pharma passed and received no reply.

Years ago Senator Kennedy's son Patrick suffered with bone cancer. Some of the treatment Patrick received was natural, beyond chem and radiation.

Even Ted's brother, President John Kennedy, was treated by a Harvard physician with natural care.

That doctor treated his own cancer naturally.

As far as brain cancers go, in Houston there is a physician who developed an effective and more natural therapy that is extremely effective for brain cancers.

This doctor, Stanislaw Burzynski, has suffered at the hands of the FDA in their effort to stop his work. Yet for three decades he has brought hope to the lives of many.

Perhaps Mr. Kennedy should go for a second opinion.

Another thought crossed my mind when thinking about this. Has anyone asked about the history of Kennedy's cell phone use?

This question is not off base, as we do know that EMF causes brain tumors.

Or has anyone considered questioning his use of aspartame in foods or medications, since the FDA clearly knows that aspartame can cause brain tumors.

A good public health oriented health care provider would be attempting to identify all possible vectors.

And last, but certainly not least, is a consideration of the health insurance and level of health care Kennedy receives.

His carte blanche health insurance is something we pay for, yet we get a fraction of that level of care in health insurance from Medicare or private and state programs. This creates classes of recipients which is taboo in equal rights concerns and discrimination issues.

I am sure that if the average person received the same diagnosis as Senator Kennedy their care would be much different. After all, few have the same "celebrity" status.

While I wish the best to Teddy, I want to be able to wish the same for anyone diagnosed with the same condition.

Better yet, I'd like to see all of it prevented.

(As Avastin has been mentioned for Kennedy, you might want to read this earlier post in this blog: Monday, March 03, 2008 A BAD DECISION ON AVASTIN)

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